The Cubicle’s Backporch

For St. Patricks Day, MrC and I went to a Mexican restaurant (Mexican is close to Irish, right?) with some friends. After getting my first margarita (b/c before then, all I can focus on is WHERE IS MY DAMN DRINK) I started looking around and noticed a couple sitting to the right of us. They were younger (late teens, maybe) and the girl was texting on her phone. I didn’t think much of it.

Halfway through my drink (what? You don’t keep track of time by the amount you’ve had to drink? Trust me- time starts FLYING after drink #3) I was looking around at people and noticed that she was still playing on her phone. With the guy she was with alternating between staring at her downturned head and staring at her phone.

Now I was intrigued.

So I kept slipping looks over there and I didn’t see them say ONE WORD to each other. She was 100% engrossed in her phone and he continued to stare at the top of her head and her phone. At one point, they flagged down the waiter and asked for more chips and salsa. And by ‘they’ I mean that he stopped the waiter and she said “Uh, can we get some more chips?” And he said “And salsa.”

It seemed like they were comfortable around each other (no first date awkwardness) but like I said, not ONE WORD TO EACH OTHER.

Toward the end of dinner (after 3 margaritas) MrC turned to me and said “That girl has been on her phone all night!” And I was all “I KNOW! I’ve been watching her!”

They left before we did, but I never heard either one of them say ‘Let’s go.’ She just put her phone away, put her coat on, and he stood up and put his coat on.

WEIRD.

But then I started thinking about teenagers these days and their wealth of technology and ability to TOTALLY IGNORE people for a whole meal. And the fact that maybe they think that’s okay.

And that led me to a whole other topic.

Have you ever read someone’s facebook status that says something like “Out to dinner with the guy/girl and having the best time EVER. I LOVE spending time with HIM/HER”? B/c whenever I read something like that, I picture them taking their phone out during this TOTALLY AWESOME dinner to get on facebook and tell the world that they are out to dinner and having SO MUCH FUN. And then I wonder how much fun they are really having if they have the thought that they must get on facebook RIGHT AWAY to tell the WORLD that they are with the person they LOVE to spend time with- all the while ignoring the person they are actually with.

This, of course, does not apply to statuses that are witty while mentioning being out with the guy/girl. Because those are entertaining.

But statuses that are posted just to tell people that you are out with your wife/husband/gf/bf/bestfriend/son/daughter and that you can’t believe how much fun you’re having?

DUMB!

Or even worse- the ones that are all “If you have the best wife/husband in the world who works hard to support you and your family and who would do anything for you b/c he loves you so much and you can’t believe how much you love him and when he farts little flowers come out because he’s perfect and he treats you like a queen and when you kiss little bubbly hearts form above your heads b/c you are SO MEANT TO BE, blah blah blah… then repost this.”

DUMB!

It’s amazing how much facebook changed when they opened it up to everyone instead of just college students. (Don’t get me wrong- I love that they opened it up to everyone, but it changed. A LOT.)

So yesterday.

I went shopping.

AND I LIKED IT.

I cannot TELL you how excited I was to like shopping again.

I know that sounds dumb, but when you gain weight, shopping isn’t so fun anymore. You got stuff that hangs out where it’s not supposed to and things just don’t fit right.

But anyway. Yesterday I went shopping for a dress for the wedding I’m in on Saturday (I’m the guestbook girl). I got this one from New York and Co for a cool $34.98

It doesn’t look that fabulous on the model, but I really like it on me. And to show how inexperienced at wedding-shopping I am, I almost tried it on IN WHITE. yeah. Like that totally wouldn’t have been lame. (”Hi my name is Jennifer, I’m the guestbook bitch and I’m wearing white! Like the bride!”)

As a side note, has anyone seen The Proposal? B/c I really want to see it. I love Sandra Bullock.

As I mentioned, Mr. C and I fought while we were on vacation (The fact that many of you admitted to fighting with your significant others while vacationing made me feel much better…). Mr. C also updated his facebook status that night (unbeknownst to me) which led to some interesting conversations with my friends in the next couple of days.

Here’s what he actually wrote:

Mr.C is omg I am f’ed up!

April 3 at 11:28pm · Comment · LikeUnlike

He doesn’t use the f-word on facebook, but notice the apostrophe after the f? So he’s trying to say “OMG I am fucked up!”

JFriend thought it said:

Mr.C is omg I am fed up!

and KFriend thought it said:

Mr.C is omg I f’ed up!

 Since I didn’t know about that status, I was surprised to hear from JFriend that Mr. C was fed up, and surprised to hear from KFriend that Mr. C felt bad. Then I saw his status and realized what had happened.

Ah. Facebook.

So I got back from vacation (Panama City Beach, Floriday) on Saturday night and I’m just now starting to feel back in the real world. But you know me- instead of we did this, and this, and this blog entry about my vacation, here are a few highlights in pictures.

We had a 14th floor ocean-view room. The people we stayed with got the room through VRBO.com. (Where owners rent out their condos) The sunsets were always gorgeous. I was able to snap this one the second night we were there.

The seagulls were everywhere. I fed them Captain Crunch off our balcony. This kid decided to taunt them with a sandwich. hee hee. There was a whole flock of them chasing him down.

Mr. C went fishing in the ocean. That’s not very entertaining, but the fact that he is wearing a poncho and it is billowing in the wind, thus making him look like he is wearing a cape- a’la Superman style? THAT is entertaining.

We went to Coyote Ugly a couple nights while we were down there. You know the bar from the movie- Coyote Ugly? It reminded me of wanting to open up my own bar. So I did some research and I’ll need about $750,000 to open a Coyote Ugly in Louisville Kentucky. Anyone want to back me?

I got this on the last day we were there. The sun was shining and it looked beautiful. I love the ocean. (Or Gulf, whatever) It’s vastness is humbling.

There was also a little drama between Mr. C and I the last night we were there. The night ended with my mom offering me a place to stay (b/c you CAN go home!) and my two very best friends in the whole world, JFriend and AFriend, offering to drive ALL THE WAY to Panama City (11 hours) to come pick me up so that I wouldn’t have to ride back in the same vehicle as Mr. C (although I didn’t take them up on it, the offer meant the world to me). Thankfully Mr. C was hungover on the way home and didn’t end up saying much (although the fact that he was near-puking the whole time did give me some satisfaction) We ended up working things out once we got home (or rather I told him what an ass he was). But seriously? Fighting on vacation is NOT FUN.

If there’s one way to forget that you’re minus a job AND that your ex-company forgot to pay you as they promised to do as part of your ’severance package’, it’s to pack up, jump in a friend’s car (or more specifically JFriend’s car) along with two of your friend’s sisters and head down to Gatlinburg (or as it turns out, Pigeon Forge) Tennessee. Around here, Gatlinburg/Pigeon Forge is a nice place to head for the weekend.

So, that’s where we headed to celebrate the fact that JFriend FINALLY graduated college.

The cabin we stayed in a was small, but it was warm, had a shower, a hottub, AND a fridge for the liquor so all was well.

After we unpacked, we decided to head to the grocery store and it took us no fewer than 30 minutes to get down the damn mountain. Seriously. Her cousin had a ‘right’ turn instead of a ‘left’ so we did a circle about four times going “What the fuck?” and passing a guy unloading groceries no fewer than four times who, on the fourth go round gave us a ‘Look at the poor dipshits who can’t get down the mountain’ wave. We also passed an elderly couple in a car who shared the same bewildered expressions we did but we didn’t wave to them for fear if the old man took one hand off the wheel they would either a.) fall off the side of the road which would lead to a tumble down the mountain, or b.) ram into us.

After getting down the mountain (and my Garmin was totally present during all this and the only thing SHE wanted me to do was turn into a driveway which she claimed was “Kristin Way” or something like that. No, Garmin, it wasn’t.) we did our grocery shopping then tried to get back UP the mountain.

Which turned out to be, like totally hard. So hard, in fact that we wound up 3000 feet in the air with GREAT VIEWS. Like this one:

Beautiful. And the cabin you see there in the right? It’s called Lasting Impressions (in Pigeon Forge, TN) and is booked through February 2010. Here’s another fabulous view:

So, we kept climbing this damn mountain (b/c Garmin SAID SO) thinking that maybe there was a road that would lead us back down the other side. Meanwhile, we passed another even BETTER view, but my phone rings and after my secretary, JFriend, screened the call (If it was a recruiter, I wanted them to think I had ‘people’), it ended up being my ex-job who called to tell me that my bonus would be a week late getting to my account. But, like I said, I missed that view.

At this point, JFriend is getting cranky claiming that we’re lost. I poo-poo her nonsense claiming that we are just looking for great VIEWS. Here’s one from the almost-top of the mountain:

My poor little camera doesn’t do the views justice. We were VERY high up.

Finally, Garmin tells us to turn left on a road, then proceeds to tell us to make a u-turn and go back down the damn mountain. At this point, I’m thinking Garmin is in cahoots with the oil companies. (”Ah-ha!” the Garmin would shout. “I’ll take them up the mountain, then back down!”)

But we finally make it back to the cabin, I get drunk on Beam and Canada Dry (really, you must try it) and after a quick dip in the hottub, ended up going to bed at 11:00. I know, but if I stayed up I would’ve wanted to drink and if I drank anymore, I would’ve THROWN UP.

The next day, after a quick stop at The Apple Barn (Where I purchased 6 bottles of apple-y wine) we headed to Gatlinburg to scour the shops and satisfy JFriend’s one wish: To ride the Gatlinburg ski lift up the damn mountain. We paid $13.00 (that place is making a freakin KILLIN) and got on this lift which is when I decided that there are some things that change as you get older- like you develop a fear of DYING. More specificially, a fear of DYING after the ski lift malfunctions and sends you careening down the fuckin’ mountain. Here is the view going up the mountain:

Yes. That shit is steep.

Anyways- we get to the top of the mountain and peruse the gift shop (I didn’t buy anything, I’ll be damned if I was going to fall down the mountain with a shot glass jabbing me in the side the whole time) then head back down.

On the way down, I realized going down is much better. I could plan my fall rather than just take it.

So we made it down the mountain, finished walking the shops (cookies and cream fudge is my weakness) and headed back to the cabin.

JFriend’s youngest sister is one helluva cook, by the way.

Anyways, so on Sunday, we got up at the ass-crack of dawn and were all in high spirits that we’d be getting back home early. Then we ran into a wreck in the mountains. The previous days rain combined with the current days freezing temperatures had caused ice on the road and lots, LOTS of fog… which had led to two wrecks with a combined total of 40 cars involved. Yeah, craziness. So we sat in the same spot for 3 hours (no shit) and amused ourselves by watching people climb the mountain to relieve themselves- one of who was an older man who didn’t quite understand that when you turn you back parallel to traffic, some cars can see your wang- including one full of 4 giggling females. Ahem.

But, the weekend is over and now it’s back to job searching. And calling my ex-job to see why they didn’t pay me. Yay.

Let’s do bullets, shall we?

• So I brought the new dog, Molly, home last night. She’s a 5-lb shitzu. A Humane Society volunteer found her along the long driveway that leads to their shelter. She was all matted and they found her just sitting there. I was excited when I saw her b/c she seemed like the perfect playmate for our other dog, Jolee. Isn’t the picture above cute? Everybody’s trying to see who the new family member is (you can see the two cats and Jolee checkin’ her out). Well, let me sum up last night in a few short sentences.
  • Molly is supposed to be fine with other dogs: She growled, snapped, and lunged at Jolee (who outweighs her by 3 lbs, but who was terrified at this spitting demon)
  • Molly is supposed to be house-trained. She shit on the floor this morning.
  • Molly is a spayed female. She humps like Hugh Hefner in his younger days. She humped my leg, my hand, my arm… She humped me when I was standing up, sitting down, and walking.
  • SOMEONE drug shit out of the kitty litter box. Since Jolee has never done this (and the cats don’t usually play with their own shit), I’m leaning toward the demon dog.

I know it was just her first night in a new home, so I’m hoping for the best. But I paid $100 (yes, adopting her from the Humane Society cost me $100… well $95) for a dog that snarls at my baby, shits on the floor, and humps. What have I done?

• My new thing is to eat breakfast and just have a snack for lunch. I went to the vending machine for my snack (cookies, chocolate chip, soft, if you were wondering) and the little ‘arm’ that rotates to release the butt builders cookies didn’t rotate all the way around. So I sent the vending company an email asking when I can expect to get my $.70 back. And yes I will follow up. They’ve screwed me out of my last pocket change.
• After commenting on a blog, I realized that Mr. C and I are saving 26% of our take home pay. Granted, some of that will go toward lake house renovations, but yay! We’re all grown up and saving money!
• The best way to keep a clean house is to get a couple of kittens. If you leave the newspaper on the table, they will knock it off and play with it ALL NIGHT LONG. If there is a leaf drug in on a shoe, they will bat it around while you’re cooking dinner until you sweep the floor. A forgotten-about plastic Wal-Mart bag? Is now a LOUD play center. This intensifies if you’re trying to sleep.
• My friend, KFriend, is getting married. And I’m in her wedding. I’ve never been in a wedding, probably b/c either a.) I haven’t had female friends who I remained close enough to to be in their wedding, or b.) the friends I’m close with are shackers who don’t marry easily (JFriend and AFriend). So, I’m actually excited to be a part of her wedding. She’s also 4 years younger than me. So I’ll be the old un-married hag in her wedding party. Rock on.
• But back to the original point of the previous bullet. KFriend is getting married and her dress is amazing. Like beyond beautiful. Like I want to wear it. If I was her size (about 5′2″ and 100 pounds) I would so wear it when she wasn’t looking. Maybe I’ll stick my leg in it just to pretend. Who knows. The pictures are below of her wedding dress. Feel free to guess how much it cost. I was amazed.

I love it. I love it.

END BORING BULLET POINTS.

From JFriend to Me:

You don’t have to be invited. Just say your coming over.

From Me to JFriend:

You used the wrong ‘your’. You said “Just say your coming over” where ‘your’ is possessive. Since I cannot possess ‘over’ I think you meant “Just say you’re coming over.” Which in long term would mean “Just say you are coming over.” Which would be correct.

You’re welcome.

From JFriend To Me:

How about STFU!!!!!!

Some friends just don’t appreciate good grammar advice.

This is gonna be another one of those probably-inappropriate posts. You’ve been warned.

 I like boobs. I like cleavage. I often admit (to certain company) that I am a boob girl. I love them. Probably because my modest B’s are only wonderful when I’m wearing a push-up bra. Mr. C jokes that if there is a girl in the room with great boobs, I notice her before he does.

I think it’s interesting how different women react to cleavage. Some women get offended. Some women watch for their husband/boyfriend/significantother to get an eyeful before yelling at them the rest of the night. Some women give the girl with great cleavage mean looks. And some women (like me) can respect another woman’s assets. If a woman is beautiful, I have no problem pointing her out to Mr. C and saying “Damn. That girl is hot.”

So, it was interesting when the new girlfriend of one of Mr. C’s friends came down to the lake a couple weekends ago. A girlfirend who was petite and had boobs like this:

Just great, perky boobs.

When we went over to LakeHusband and Lakewife’s house to play some cornhole (damn game!), and GreatBoobGirl was wearing a wifebeater, I laughed as all the guy’s eyes got big and they started beating on their chest and grunting at each other. I’ll even admit that I couldn’t stop staring whenever she would bend over to pick up a beanbag.

The boyfriend wasn’t impressed though, and they ended up heading back to our house before everyone else left. Once they left, us group of girls got together and agreed that she had great boobs and it was hard not to stare at them.

Ends up, the boyfriend was afraid that all the lake people were going to think that GreatBoobGirl was ’showing off’ and trying to get attention, which is probably how most females react in a normal setting. But at the lake, we’re pretty open and not afraid to compliment another chick, and MOST of the females don’t flip out when their man checks out another chick. (Because, to be fair, we do lots of ogling when a well-muscled male pulls up in a nice-ass boat!)

It’s funny that today, most women will attack the woman for looking good, rather than the boyfriend/husband for ogling her.

So my question to you is how do you view cleavage? If you catch your guy (or girl) looking, are you offended? Pretend not to notice? Or do you chalk it up to a guy-being-a guy? And if you have big boobs, does it get old when people stare at them? What about when girls stare at them?

And doesn’t the above chick have great boobs? (Yes, that’s her picture that I yanked from her myspace page, hopefully she doesn’t read my blog)

Best Comment Quote from Previous Post

“Do think if I added a Weight Loss page to my blog that it would immediately help me lose weight? I could sooooo go for that.”

from jyl at mommygossip.

Because I hope that my Weight Loss page keeps me on track. I can’t stand another fat season!!

I’ve been ‘lucky’ in the fact that I’ve had the ‘priviledge’ of being immersed in the male world many a times. For one, I went to engineering school where there was usually only one or two other females in my classes. If I didn’t have male friends, I didn’t have friends.

This led to many interesting questions both ways, but that’s a whole other post. (’How do tampons, ya know, work?’- from them, and ‘Is it weird peeing next to other guys?’-from me)

This past weekend at the lake, I was, again, stuck in a sort of guys-night-out type thing. LakeHusband came down but LakeWife didn’t b/c she had homeowork. FriendDownTheRoad also came down, and his wife didn’t. So for the most part, it was FriendDownTheRoad, LakeHusband, Mr. C, and myself.

A quick side note: Remember the Lake House neighbor who took a shit behind LakeHusband’s garage? (From now on known as TheShittyNeighbor) Well, he and his wife came out on the boat with us. While out there, he managed to: pee while sitting on the front of the boat, talk about shitting on the boat (oh! the irony!), and make other weird comments. His wife, in an effort to show that the skirt on her bathing suit was indeed part of her bathing suit, pulled her bottoms down to show LakeHusband and FriendDownTheRoad her lady bits. Yeah.

So, later, the four of us were eating dinner and FriendDownTheRoad tells us that TheShittyNeighbor is constantly talking about what a disappointment his wife is in bed. He says that she has a great body and is just a huge disappointment. She has a (really fabulously done) boob job and he said that he can’t touch her nipples b/c they’re ‘too sensitive’ and if he goes down on her, he can’t lick her you-know-what b/c it’s too sensitive, so he has to lick above it. I guess he left her for a month or so and always talks about the woman he hooked up with and how great it was to be with a woman who actually liked having sex.

This led FriendDownTheRoad to say that he joked with his wife that she was ‘upping’ things up a notch b/c she was worried that he would say that she was a disappointment in bed. We all laughed at that.

 So now that I know about TheShittyNeighbor’s wife’s extreme sensitivity, I feel better. I’m sure you do too.

Best Previous Post Comment Quote:

“…just deep breath IN and then let it out….aaaaahahhhhh….”

-April at Thoughts In My Tumulutous Brain

b/c sometimes I need to be told to chill the hell out.

**Warning this is a totally innappropriate post. Well, depending on how you feel about the f word. (No, not fuck. That word is never innappropriate.)(Well, maybe it would be at a funeral.)(Or maybe at a wedding. (Like- ‘man, the bride’s a bitch, the groom is fucked’ during a Best Man speech))(End incorrect use of parenthesis.)**

**Also, I’m going to pick the winner of the Venus Embrace Giveaway tonight!** 

There’s one thing that intrigues me about people in relationships.

How they deal with each other farting.

I know it sounds dumb, but really… some couples are weird about it, some couples pretend like it doesn’t exist, and some couples use it as a weapon against each other.

Case 1: For example? After the concert (and a couple of drinks) last weekend, AFriend said that her current boyfriend is the first guy she’s ever farted in front of. They ride together to work and she seemed pretty proud of the fact that they would fart in the car, then lock the windows so that the other person had to smell it. This coming from the chick who is all about manners and the proper way of doing things.

Case 2: My roommate during my freshman year in college, RoommateT, had a boyfriend who would hold her down and fart on her head. (They are now married with a kid)

Case 3: LakeHusband and LakeWife have no secrets when it comes to farting. LakeHusband once made ME gag after farting while we were all sitting around talking on the deck. (And I grew up on a hog farm! That’s some stank shit!) They also proudly tell us when they Dutch Oven each other. (Dutch Oven, for the record, is when you fart while in bed together, and hold the covers over the other persons head so that they have to ya know- marinate in it.)

Case4: JFriend and her boyfriend don’t have any problem farting in front of each other.

So now I know yer wondering, what about me and Mr. C? How do we handle it?

Let me give you a little background first. Farting was never a big deal in my house growing up. We had no problems owning up to it. And you knew when Dad rolled up the window that he was gettin’ ready to stink the van up and you better gasp your last breath of fresh air.

My friends and I would have sleepovers and COUNT the number of farts for the night. I remember one night getting past 100. (One of our favorite phrases was ‘Silent but Deadly’.) I remember mortifying one of my elementary school friends by telling a couple of guys that she was known as the Fart Queen for her great ability to boost the Fart Count numbers.

All that being said, I specifically remember the first night I ever farted on Mr. C. We were living in my old apartment and we’d been dating for about 9 months by then. I was actually asleep and it WOKE ME UP. Then I realized that my stomach was grumbling and I spent that whole day in the bathroom AND throwing up. (Thank you family and your easy transfer of viruses) So I forgave myself for that one.

But really? Mr. C and I don’t fart in front of each other. Not that it would be a big deal (or doesn’t happen sometimes), but we just don’t do it. AFriend said that once you have kids, nothing is too gross. Maybe that’s the case.

 So, share it… how do you and your significant other (or even just you and your friends) deal with farting?